


then you go and cut me down

by Isagawa



Category: The Social Network (2010)
Genre: Fix-it fic, M/M, Slow Burn, kind of, these two deserve so much love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-24
Updated: 2017-03-24
Packaged: 2018-10-10 03:39:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10428312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Isagawa/pseuds/Isagawa
Summary: "He misses him, almost physically, every fiber of his body a burning pain when he is less than 10 feet away. But it doesn’t change the fact that Mark still makes him want to puke — or cry — or hide in a corner for the rest of his life.He walks past Mark without answering and doesn’t see the expression on his face- incomprehension, despair."





	

**Author's Note:**

> I just want to thank all the authors that have written on this fandom. I may not have left comments or kudos to everyone, but your fics, even more than the movie, have inspired me a lot, and this one-shot wouldn't be here without you. THANK YOU. YOU ARE SO TALENTED. MUCH LOVE.

 

 

>   
>  _"You tell me that you need me then you go and cut me down, but wait_  
>  _You tell me that you're sorry, didn't think I'd turn around, and I say_  
>  _It's too late to apologize - it's too late."_
> 
> \- That One Republic song that goes so well with these two until I WRITE A FANFIC TO MAKE IT RIGHT
> 
>  

* * *

 

 

I’d like to talk, Mark says, eyes unfocused (or focused somewhere else, he doesn’t quite know). It’s the fourth time they meet since the lawsuit. One per year _—_ and Mark hadn’t bothered trying any sooner. I’d like to talk, Mark says. He seems bored. He’s not, Eduardo knows, but that’s what his face says. Eduardo wants to tear his face apart.

Eduardo laughs. “No.”

 

*

 

_What do I need to do?_

The e-mail only comes six months later. Eduardo reads it twice. He thinks, if it has taken six months just for him to figure out he has to listen to me, it’s not enough. He thinks, this question almost sounds like an order. He thinks, I won’t obey him anymore. I expect more.

He doesn’t quite know what he expects. He thinks, I don’t have to figure out; Mark does.

He doesn’t answer the e-mail.

 

*

 

What do I need to do?, Mark asks, to his face this time, one year later. Eduardo thinks that maybe, this is closer to what he expects.

He misses him, almost physically, every fiber of his body a burning pain when he is less than 10 feet away. But it doesn’t change the fact that Mark still makes him want to puke _—_ or cry _—_ or hide in a corner for the rest of his life.

He walks past Mark without answering and doesn’t see the expression on his face- incomprehension, despair.

 

*

 

“You need to talk to him, Eduardo.” He almost sputters his water on the table. He coughs, hard, about four times. His chest burns.

He is at his parents’. His father went to sleep. His mother just came in his old bedroom. She looks at him, her eyes focused on him, clear and still.

“I can’t,” Eduardo says.

“Yes you can, and you should. You need to.”

“Dad wouldn’t like it.”

He trembles. His mother looks at him. Her eyes tell a million stories. For the first time in his life, she says, “your father doesn’t need to know.”

 

*

 

Eduardo cries the night after that, back at his apartment, because it feels like the whole world is crumbling down and he had sworn not to feel like this anymore.

 

*

 

It’s three months later, in the evening, and Eduardo comes to a business meeting. He doesn’t come _for_ the reunion though. He comes in and walks to Mark right away, Mark seeing him approach.

Mark, Eduardo says. He sees something like fear flicker in his eyes. He didn’t expected it, he thinks; and he is pleased.

Wardo, Mark says, but hasn’t the time to say more.

You need to apologize, Eduardo says, because he can’t put up with himself being called _Wardo_ by the man who is supposedly a traitor and his ex-best friend and his worst enemy. You need to apologize, he says, because it’s not like nothing happened. It’s not.

You need to apologize, he says, and a sour grin appears on his face, because he knows Mark won’t, ever, or with a half-voice, his eyes away, not quite meaning it, justifying himself, thinking he has done the best for the firm, that it wasn’t personal — as if it still mattered, as if it mattered before.

You need to apologize, he says.

Mark does.

That is what will still seem so crazy about that night, twenty years later, when Eduardo is old and reflects on his life— _Mark does_.

 

*

 

“I can’t forgive you. But I accept your apology.”

 

*

 

Their lips crash into each other. It feels like dying and coming to life. It feels like falling from a plane and crashing onto water. It feels like everything is where it is supposed to be, and he belongs.

Their lips crash into each other. Once he’s got him, Eduardo doesn’t let him go. Eduardo wonders if he could forgive him one day. He doesn’t know yet. He slides his tongue in his mouth, scratches his back.

 _Wardo_ , Mark says, low and needy, copper strands spread on his forehead.

It feels like he could forgive him.

 

*

 

Three months later and they still see each other. Each meeting a risk to make everything crumble down; and still, they see each other. They like to play it dangerous. Or they don’t like it, but they can’t do it any other way.

They don’t really talk. They will. Just not now.

It is intoxicating to discover the other all over again, not by words -- words manipulate, words hurt, Eduardo thinks -- but by body language. He can see Mark isn’t used to listening to anyone. Everything has to go his way. Yet Eduardo says, several times, _stop it, I don’t want it_. Mark looks at him, a bit lost, but draws back; learns.

Three months later and they are in a hotel room (it’s more simple than to choose between their homes, and a home still seems too personal for now). On the bed, their limbs unfold. Eduardo goes lower and lower, placing kisses down on his legs, behind the knee, Mark jerks and he laughs. Mark, chin up, looks at the ceiling, his arm on his eyes, and he hums something-- knowing him, it could as well be some binary code he tries to remember to keep his thoughts clear.

Eduardo licks, intimate and warm, in the inside of his thigh. He hears Mark’s breath shudder. And Mark whines: _Please_.

It’s the first time he says something like this.

 

He leans in and puts his hand on Mark’s crotch, as the other tangles his ankles behind Eduardo’s back.

 

*

He groans. Trembles. Whines. Shudders. Stills. Begs. Kisses. Cries out.

he says fuck

and says fuck

and says _fuck_ _—_

 

_*_

 

I think I could forgive you, Eduardo says on the phone, six weeks later, because he had to travel to the Philippines for work and he feels lonely in his hotel room. (He feels lonely, now, whenever Mark isn’t here.)

He hears Mark’s breath stop for a few seconds; and then:

Why would you?, he asks.

Eduardo thinks that maybe, this is the sign he was waiting for, the one telling him it’s a good idea to try.

 

Because, Eduardo says, I want to.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not a native English-speaker (French girl here!) so if there is any English mistake please please please do tell me!


End file.
